Page:Later Life (1919).djvu/157

Rh "I'll have something with you!" said Emilie. "I'm faint with hunger . . . What a day, good God, what a day!"

"We'll get something to eat in between," said Louise. "Come, Emilie, come to my room."

And, as if they were fleeing again, this time from the children, she dragged Emilie up to her own room.

"Emilie, do be sensible!" she implored.

"Louise, I mean what I said, give me a glass of wine, a biscuit, anything: I'm sinking . . ."

Louise went out and Emilie was left alone. She looked around the bright, cosy sitting-room, stamped with the gentle personality of its owner: there were many books about; the doors of a book-case were open.

"The dear girl!" thought Emilie, lying back wearily in a chair. "She lives her own life peacefully . . . and, when there's anything wrong, she's the one who helps. Her life just goes on, the same thing day after day! She was a girl while we were still children; and, properly speaking, we never knew her as we know one another. She's fond of Otto, just as I'm very fond of Otto . . . but, apart from that, her life just goes on in the same way . . . She's always silent . . . She just lives and reads up here . . . and, if there's anything wrong, she's the one who helps . . . What have I done, my God, what have I done! . . . But I won't go back! . . ."